The Blue Shield

Great report T-Hawk, and an excellent analysis of the specialists. I don't know why I didn't take the building-multiplier effect into account when using police, I used several in core cities just to get rid of the corruption, but never thought to use them instead of engineers if I wanted shields. But then again, I didn't have that many factories, and no power plants, so for pure shields, Engineers were probably still the better choice. But they certainly beat out taxmen on the other side of the equation, for cities with market and bank, they generate 2gpt and the shield, if there are corrupted sheilds remaining. Funny thing is, I WAS taking the buildings into account when deciding on scientists vs. taxmen in specific towns.

I didn't realize you had tweaked the map so much, but I knew those lakes were quite fortuitous. The ready availability of luxuries was also suprising, especially for C3C, when they tend to be more clumped and less available. The strategics seemed about normal for C3C, although I never ran into any problems with them. The iron could have been iffy if I had delayed getting Iron Working more than I had, as I quickly rushed a temple to get it before Carthage landed near there. Salt wasn't a problem, as Cleo and Hanni were already on tundra islands by the time I got gunpowder.

BTW, I passed the MicroManagement pop-quiz, I also got the 2 warriors in 9 turns with MM'ing the forest. But maybe I failed the exam, as I think I'm the only one who didn't build a granary in Entremont. I normally do go for an early granary, but with the limited shields, and plenty of other high-food sites available, I didn't think it would pay off on the investment soon enough, so I went directly for settlers, with some warriors in between. I wasn't sure whether it was the right move at the time, but it seemed a good fit for the situation.

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